XVIII Impetuoso

“I’m sorry to be so late, but I had an emergency, ” Katherina said, as she stepped up onto the dressmaker’s stand.

“It’s no problem, hun, ” the costume designer said cheerfully as she set to work, snipping through the thread that held the hem in place. “Is it solved, your emergency? ”

“No, it’s not. Something very valuable fell out of my bag yesterday. This morning I went back to every place I had been—for the second time—and then, when the shops opened, I stopped at each one just in case anyone had found something. ”

“I’m so sorry. Are you sure it wasn’t stolen? ”

“That would make no sense. My wallet wasn’t touched. What I lost was my father’s journal, and no one would be interested in a battered old book. No, I’m sure it fell out of my bag during the evening. I called the sanitation department to try to keep them from throwing it away with the city trash if they found it on the street. I’m still a wreck about it. ”

“It sounds like you did all the right things. Maybe someone found it and turned it in at their hotel. You should check with all the hotels in the area too. ”

“Yes, that’s a good idea. ” Katherina felt a faint surge of hope and forced herself to concentrate on the work at hand. “Thanks also for making time to alter the costume. It was obviously made for a shorter, plumper soprano than I am. ”

“Don’t worry about it, hun. It’s easier making a wide, short costume smaller and longer than the other way around. And just between you and me, the dress looks loads better on you. But you didn’t hear me say that. ” Anne’s lighthearted analysis of every aspect of the Salzburg opera world was cheering, like her American-accented German.

“Thank you for the compliment. But the dress is beautiful. Did you design it? ” Katherina held up a pinch of skirt, trying to feel interest.

“Yes, but dresses are not really my thing. I’m better at designing boys’ clothing. ”

“Really? You did Octavian’s costume, then? I mean the white one for the rose scene. ”

“I did them all. Octavian, the Baron, the palace guard, the whole shebang. ’Course I have people sewing for me, but I do the design. I did over thirty costumes in two weeks. ” Anne snipped the thread holding the hem in place and undid the fold at the bottom of the skirt. Then, getting to her feet, she inserted a row of pins down the two seams of the bodice, first on the left and then on the right.

“You must be glad that’s over. ”

“It’s never over, hun. I’m doing the Spanish soldiers in Hanover next month where Anastasia Ivanova is singing Carmen. One of my specialties is women’s ‘trouser’ roles. I had a lot of fun doing her Octavian. ”

Katherina visualized the white satin breeches and waistcoat the young Count wore in the second act. On Anastasia, they were absolutely gorgeous. Even her full bosom was only hinted at under the glittering waistcoat. “Are men’s costumes for women different from men’s costumes for men? ”

“Oh, absolutely. For starters, you have to compensate for all the round female parts. I once made a Cherubino outfit for a singer who was five months pregnant. Boobies out to here. ” She held a cupped hand a distance from her own chest. “But if I had my druthers, I’d do military. Soldiers, police, Cossacks. The Pentagon should hire me. I’d get those boys out of olive drab and into some really snappy outfits. ”

“Hello, ladies. ” A man stood in the doorway, mustached and avuncular. “This gonna take a while? ”

“Hey, there’s my favorite soldier. ” Anne twisted her head to glance back at him while she checked the lacing at the back of the costume. “Hi, hun. No, not much longer. ” She knelt down again and tugged on Katherina’s skirt, pulling it to its new length. “What j’a think? ”

“Dunno. It’s not lit yet. ”

“Oh, sorry. Katherina, this is my husband, Chuck. He does the stage lighting. ”

“Yep. I’m the one who makes you look real purdy up on stage. No matter if you got a face to scare the horses. Once I got my lights on you, I can make you look like a million bucks. ”

“He’s speaking in the abstract, ” Anne said reassuringly. “Chuck, hun. You make Katherina sound like an ogre. ”

“No, I understood him. He just means it’s all in the presentation, and he’s good at it. You both are. Reality doesn’t stand a chance. ”

“Reality? What’s that? ” Waving her husband away from the room, Anne helped Katherina out of the costume. “We don’t do reality here. We’re in the business of illusion. ”

“That’s what Detlev says. Though for him it’s all in the coif. ” Katherina pulled on slacks and a shirt again and sat down to watch while Anne turned the costume right side out and hung it on a hanger.

“Detlev is a sweetheart, isn’t he? And he’s right. Good hair, spiffy clothes, great lighting, and you’ve got the world in your hand. Isn’t it nice that he and Hans have hooked up? They make such a delightful, funny couple. ”

Katherina was taken aback by the American’s lighthearted candor. “Detlev and Hans? I had no idea. But I’m not sure Detlev would like people talking so openly about his affairs. I mean, technically, it’s still illegal in Austria, isn’t it? ”

“Hun, just don’t you worry about Detlev. He’s got past that fear thing a long time ago. It’s no issue in the theater world anyhow, and Lord knows, if it was, you’d have to just about shut this place down. Fact is, we owe it to him not to whisper about him, thinking we protect him. We should celebrate out loud with him, just like we celebrate with other folks when they get engaged or have kids. Don’t you think? ”

Katherina hesitated. “It just seems like something intimate that people don’t talk about. Shouldn’t we respect his privacy? ”

“Privacy? How’s that? Is it private when I introduce my husband to you? Or when a woman announces she’s going to have a baby? Why should it be private if someone like Detlev has a boyfriend? The subject isn’t sex. The subject is husband, partner, baby. Oh, I’m sorry, hun. There I go lecturing again. ” She took a few stitches to repair the lace on the front of the dress and bit through the thread.

“You’re right, of course. He shouldn’t have anything to be secretive about. I just never thought about it that way. ”

“Well, I’m not going to tell you how to think. But if everyone gay was open about it, we might find we have gay brothers, plumbers, preachers, firemen, fathers, and opera singers. Then there’d be one less stupid thing for people to be afraid of. ” Anne hung up the costume and brushed it smooth.

Katherina collected her shoulder bag, recalling again what she was upset about. “I guess I’d better—”

“’Scuse me. ” Chuck stood in the doorway again. “Don’t mean to be bothering you again. ”

“No bother, hun. What’s up? ”

“The boys and me, we was throwing out some old light bulbs and cables and stuff, and we come across this. ” He held up the battered journal.

Katherina gasped. “That’s the journal I’ve been looking for. I dropped it someplace yesterday and I was afraid I’d lost it forever. ” She took it and brushed grit and sawdust from the cover. “Where did you find it? ”

“In the trash bin out behind the theater. It didn’t have no name in it, but there was a bookmark. ” He pointed to the folded schedule tucked between two pages. “Seein’ as how it was your personal rehearsal schedule, I figured it might belong to you. On the other hand, it’s all tore up, so maybe it was yours and you threw it away. I thought I’d ask. ”

“Oh, Chuck. Thank you. You’ve saved me so much anguish. But you’re right. Someone has torn a whole section out of it. ” Bewildered, Katherina examined the dates before and after the gap. “They’ve ripped out everything from the 1950s. ”

Anne peered over her shoulder. “Well, it was a pretty boring decade, but ripping apart a journal for it seems a little extreme. ”

“Looks to me like whoever found it decided the only part they liked was the ’50s and they tossed the rest. ”

“What happened in the ’50s? In the journal, I mean. ” Anne asked.

“I don’t know. I hadn’t read that part. ”

“Well, I guess something’s better than nothing, ” Chuck concluded. “Anyhow, I got to finish cleaning up. I’ll swing by again in half an hour when you close up for the day, ” he said to his wife.

“Thanks, again, Chuck, ” Katherina called after the departing man. Bemused, she stared again at the eviscerated journal, wondering if she now faced the biggest mystery of all. What had happened in the 1950s?

Back in her hotel room, Katherina set aside the music she planned to study in order to examine the remains of the journal. The entries at the beginning of the 1960s might give a hint of what had happened earlier. She lit the gas fire in the corner and sat down, letting the book open to the first remaining entry after the torn pages, at the end of 1962.

She did not recall much of the year herself. Motherless and struggling to recover from diphtheria, she had focused only on herself and had emerged a changed person. It occurred to her only now that her father might have also changed. In fact, the new entries seemed to come from a different man.

October 7, 1962

How is it possible to know a man for over fifteen years, to have accepted favors from him, done business with him, sat with him over beer, and not know that he was a monster.

Worse, I was part of his filthy network. But no more. I’m free of him and all the rest of it in Auerbach’s Cellar. I’d go to the police but I know they’d send me to jail along with the others. Schalk knows it too; he knows he’s safe from me. A stalemate then, that neither of us will report the other. But over the course of ten years, I’ve noted the names of his clients and their locations. Some day, maybe…

I wish I’d broken ties with him earlier. But I thought I needed him. Until I met Nikki, all on my own.

It was in a shabby little bar called the Insel that I’d heard about in Schö neberg. I wandered in, not expecting anything. Just a place to sit and listen to the sort of slow jazz they played on records A few men and women were dancing slowly, though I was sure the women were all prostitutes. Then, from nowhere, an angelic creature glided in and sat down. Long wavy black hair, beautiful soft eyes with bottomless black pupils. Graceful gestures and full sensuous lips that sent heat to my groin. A Moroccan probably, I didn’t ask. A single earring caught the light and sparkled at me. I bought the obligatory drink and we spoke a little—“What’s your name? ” and “You from around here? ” A meaningless exchange to give the illusion we were getting to know each other. I did not give my own name, and I am sure that doe-eyed “Nikki” was lying too, but it didn’t matter.

“They have back rooms, ” Nikki said. “If you want to go where it’s quiet. You just have to order a drink, then pay for it with a fifty-mark bill and say, ‘No change, thank you. ’ They’ll give you a key. ”

The “quiet back room” was a filthy little closet with a bed that I’m sure we were not the first to use. But Nikki’s skin was so fragrant and so soft, the body so graceful and supple and acquiescent that I was ready in one minute. I tried not to go too fast. I tried to be tender. But I had waited so long, I was like a teenage boy, bursting. In just a few moments it was done and I lay exhausted. Nikki made some excuse and left. I knew that I had paid for the semblance of love, but it didn’t matter. I knew where to go for it now, I knew how to set it up, I knew how much it cost.

Sweet, soft, pliant Nikki. I wonder if I’ll meet him again next week.

That was it then. The single word “him” was the piece of the puzzle she had missed. Her father was homosexual.

One more shock to add while she still reeled from all the others: that he had invaded Berlin with the Red Army and had fought with them at Stalingrad. He was, as Anne said, one of the brothers, plumbers, preachers, firemen, fathers who were forced to love in secret. He was, by the law of the time, a criminal. She didn’t condemn him, but it sickened her to know about the other life, the underworld he lived in. Even in the current day, he would be relegated to a special category of socially marginal people.

What perverse vein ran through the mind of a public that condemned him, but was delighted to see a transvestite soprano sing love songs to a woman? People paid large sums of money for the pretty titillation of a stage embrace. Was it morbid curiosity? A small safe step toward Gomorrah they could shrug off?

She wondered where she stood on the spectrum of hypocrisy. When she sang with Octavian in her arms, did she too simply thrill at the small taste of Gomorrah while remaining blameless? Or was there something more?

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